


Steve Rogers and the Accidental Pumpkin Arms Race

by BigSciencyBrain



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Captain America Steve Rogers/Modern Bucky Barnes, Fluffy Fluff and More Fluff, Holidays, M/M, Not Canon Compliant, Yet another attempt at Happy Steve Bingo that I never finished, because I’m a very slow writer, eventually, not even remotely, this is nothing but fluff
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-09
Updated: 2019-06-09
Packaged: 2020-04-23 04:52:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,965
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19143937
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BigSciencyBrain/pseuds/BigSciencyBrain
Summary: Now in retirement, Steve Rogers discovers the joys and challenges of home ownership in a small New England town, including many trips to the hardware store and a reclusive neighbor with a competitive streak when it comes to holiday decorating.





	Steve Rogers and the Accidental Pumpkin Arms Race

It starts with a pumpkin.

A nice one, made of pale yellow ceramic with a cheerful electric light shining out of the smiling mouth and flickering like a candle. It’s magic as far as Steve’s concerned and the fact that it looks happy, even overjoyed, to greet the potential kids coming up the sidewalk is what hooked Steve in the home decor store. It was a nice pumpkin and it deserved a good home. He’d waited until the first of October, however impatient he was to set it out on the top step, because it didn’t seem fitting to start decorating for Halloween before September made a proper exit.

Now that it’s sitting alone on the enormous wrap-around porch of the equally enormous house he’s supposed to rattle around in until further notice, he thinks he should’ve bought out the store of the damn things. By itself, it looks lonely and a little desperate.

He might be projecting.

International treaties requiring him to retire - _ temporarily _ , Stark had promised - didn’t inspire warm, fuzzy feelings of security and happiness. Stark scooped up the house in a sleepy Connecticut town at an estate sale and dropped it in Steve’s lap, complete with everything inside it. The previous owner had passed with no remaining living relatives to sort through the debris of a lifetime, which left it all to Steve and, if he was being overly generous, the covert surveillance detail that moved in halfway down the block. He doubts they’d appreciate him showing up on their doorstep with a basket of muffins as a welcome to the neighborhood gift. Still, his forced exile made him feel both lonely and like a bug under a microscope at the same time.

So he’d gone out in a fitful urge to get away from them, as much as he was allowed, and he’d found the pumpkin.

There had been pumpkin shaped lanterns at the store too, he remembers, his fingers jerking reflexively around his key ring. He could still go back and buy the rest of the pumpkins. And the lanterns.

The Accords don’t say he can’t decorate his house. 

If revenge is living his best life in spite of them, then he is going to live his best life twenty-four seven until Merriam-Webster, or the Internet, decides to make it into a new verb.

He’s nearly to the car when he realizes that he needs more than a half-baked idea of putting pumpkins around the porch if he wants to stage his act of passive resistance. He needs research. He needs a  _ plan _ . This is a new battlefield; he needs the lay of the land, needs to gather his resources.

Inside the house is still an infinite To-Do list. He navigates around a lifetime of furniture, most of it still draped with cheap sheets to keep the dust off, or the mice out, he’s not certain which or if it actually worked either way. In the week since Tony handed over the keys and told him JARVIS had already programmed the address into his car’s GPS, he’s cleared just enough space to live. One cabinet in the kitchen filled with pasta mixes and breakfast cereals, one chair at the dining table, and one of the smaller bedrooms with an antique bed that he’s terrified is going to collapse under him in the middle of the night, and an equally antique dresser now filled with jeans, t-shirts, and comfy sweaters. 

Half of the main hallway is deep red wallpaper with yellow and blue flowers. The other half is painted the same green color he sees on ads for yoga spa retreats. It’s unique, he’ll give the old house that, and he’s pretty sure it was loved, even if that love came from a family with very interesting decorating taste.

Despite being new to the neighborhood, he’s already getting junk mail, magazines, and catalogs. Since none of them are for the previous owner, he has a sneaking suspicion Natasha signed him up for half of the mail that comes pouring through the slot every afternoon. She probably thought it would make him feel less lonely if he had slick, glossy pages filled with ways to spend ridiculous amounts of money. But he remembers seeing orange and red, leaves and pumpkins, and a ghost or two, so he hunts through the piles on the dining table until he’s sorted out all of the relevant catalogs and magazines.

With a sharpie and a notebook, he settles in to figure out what he needs. He can visualize the porch well enough but he should take measurements, and then there’s the walk up to the house, and the stretch of sidewalk in front. Classy, he thinks, would be a better fit for the quiet neighborhood. There’s a boxy, white church with a bell tower and a bright red door across the street, and a sculpted granite memorial to World War II veterans further down. Tony probably thought that was hilarious. But zombies and ghouls somehow seem disrespectful, or at least insensitive, given those relatively somber neighbors. He steers away from anything that seems intent on being scary or horrifying. He doesn’t want horrifying; he’s had more than a lifetime’s worth of that.

He wants the kids to see his house and smile, not scream. Preferably, he’d like the parents to feel comfortable too. It needs to be welcoming. But not in a way that reminds them of witches who live in candy houses and eat children, which he thinks is probably a fine line to walk. It’s not like he can put a sign for the Parent-Teachers Association in a window. He’ll have to figure out another way to broadcast that he’s  _ safe _ .

For a moment, he misses the shield. That probably would’ve done the trick.

Tucking that thought into the back of his mind, he goes back over the catalogs with dog-eared pages and starts writing down product numbers. They all have websites and he can place the orders after lunch. He wonders if the security detail will try to open the boxes before he gets them, briefly imaging them harassing delivery drivers every time they pull in. Maybe he’ll give them a heads up and let them know the packages are coming. Sarah Rogers didn’t raise him to be rude to people just doing their jobs, no matter how much he doesn’t want them there.

Decorating seems an easy enough problem to solve, which leaves what he’s going to hand out on the actual night. There’s always the individually wrapped candy bars and sweets, but they seem so impersonal in addition to being unhealthy. He’s pretty sure the internet has solved this problem already, but he’ll need to test the solutions first, both to make sure they’re not inedible and that he can actually create them without ending up with what Sam refers to as a Pinterest Fail. 

He doesn’t know how Sam finds the time to keep up with all the memes.

He also has to pick treats that don’t veer toward witch-in-candy-house. A costume might help, or the lack of a costume. He could probably dig out the old clothes SHIELD provided when they were trying to break him into a new century as gently as possible; they’d count as a costume. If he looks friendly while he’s handing out candied apples and wrapped sweets, they probably won’t think he’s trying to poison anyone. He might be projecting again. Either Natasha’s worn off on him or he’s learned to be paranoid all on his own.

It occurs to him as he’s placing the first order that he may have gone overboard. That he  _ always _ goes overboard, in fact, and that he has no idea where he’s going to store all the boxes as they arrive. Clearing out the dining room and front living room bump up from nice-to-haves to must-have-before-Saturday. He might as well tackle the ugly wallpaper while he’s at it.

His next list is for the nearest hardware and home improvement store, where he realizes he doesn’t know if the house came with a rake for the leaves and spends an hour comparing models of leaf blowers as though leaf blowing is a  _ thing _ he’ll be doing every fall for the rest of his life.

Also, there are roses and according to the nice young man in the garden center, they need winterizing. He adds gloves, garden shears, twine, and twice as much mulch as he probably needs. Better to have more than not enough. He’s not sure what else in the yard needs pruning or winterizing or whatever else there is to do with plants. They seem like a lot of work for a bunch of stems with decorative leaves. None of his SHIELD briefings covered yard maintenance, which seems like a glaring oversight now. What if he’d been undercover on a mission and needed to prune a rose bush? It sounds like roses are temperamental and only like to be pruned a certain way. He might’ve blown a mission by doing it wrong.

He’ll admit that sending him on an undercover mission was akin to parking a tank in a parking lot and trying to pretend it was a Volkswagen, but still, he  _ might _ have needed to know about roses. Natasha probably knows about roses.

It takes several trips back and forth from the hardware store and another three trips to the market to find everything on his ingredient list. The pumpkin spice butter caramels look the easiest so he figures he’ll try those first. Sacks of groceries make the kitchen a top priority and he spends most of the night emptying out the cabinets, setting aside pans and kitchen tools he’ll need. He’s never heard of half of them, but they’re on his list for one recipe or another. 

He’s elbows deep into scrubbing out the corners when he hears the rumble of his neighbor’s enormous truck pull into the drive next to his. The sound cuts off, followed by the creaking rattle of the garage door going up and down. He checks his watch just to be sure it’s the time he thinks it is and wonders about his neighbor. He’s met the rest of the neighborhood’s denizens during normal, expected hours, but all he’s seen of the neighbor to the north is the truck.

There’s a logo on the side of the truck; Barnes Restoration. What exactly Barnes restores until three in the morning, he has no idea, but he’s picked up enough to know this town is big on history. He’s practically living in a time capsule. And if the night owl, Mister Barnes, knows a few things about antiques, then Steve might have a fighting chance of figuring out what to do with the furniture and knick-knacks filling the house to the brim. There are baskets hanging from the ceiling in the finished attic room, filled with buttons and bits of sea glass and little corn husk doll heads. He’d taken one look and closed the door, unable to imagine what the previous owner did with those odds and ends when they were alive, let alone what he’s supposed to do with them now. He’s not too proud to ask his neighbors for suggestions.

Dawn rolls in just as he’s finishing the kitchen, everything clean and put away, leaving him to stumble through a shower and fall onto the terrifyingly small bed to catch a few hours of sleep. Retired means he can stay up all night cleaning his kitchen if he wants to and then sleep half the next day.

He makes it to noon before the sun lancing through the part of the heavy curtains lands right over his face and then he’s wide awake, if not entirely well-rested. After downing a double batch of pancakes and a pot of coffee, he heads out with his phone in hand, already set on a gardening website, to winterize the roses. Once he’s started on the roses, he discovers the hedges need trimming, there are downed branches littering the backyard, and the leaves are entirely out of control. 

There’s  _ a lot _ of Googling before he corrals the last of the leaves with the leaf blower and rakes them into black leaf bags. He saves enough to use as top cover for the roses, around the tree roots, and a few other spots in the flowerbeds. The yard must have been beautiful once. He can see the remnants of what must’ve taken a lot of time and effort to build, only to slowly fade back into wild brambles when it became too much work for the previous owner. Maybe there are plans of what they had in mind somewhere in the house and he could restore the flowerbeds to their prime once spring comes. It feels strange to think about spring after so much time spent counting the passage of time in healing wounds and battles fought.

Lost in thought, he barely notices the sun begin to slip behind the trees. A chill, fall wind brings goosebumps over his arms and he calls it a day, heading inside for a warm meal. In the kitchen, he sees lights on in the workshop behind his neighbor’s house. Odd hours probably meant Barnes was his own boss and didn’t have a lot of people working for him. His mind supplies a detailed image of a man bent over a workbench, tools spread out around him as he painstakingly repairs an old clock or an intricate piece of woodwork. It’s a romantic image, like a Rembrandt, full of warm, yellow light and the smell of wood.

The reality is probably different. Even woodworking is different now, with automated milling machines, 3-D printers, and computers that translate impossible ideas into intricate shapes. Still, he thinks someone who restores old things for a living must have a decent respect for the old methods and what it took to create the old things. Barnes must appreciate the skill of a master craftsman’s hand.

He catches himself, half caught up in his fantasy of the reclusive restorer of  _ unknown things, _ and shakes himself loose. Before he retired, he never allowed himself that kind of idle daydreaming. It’s dusk now and his grumbling stomach demands a pot of pasta thrown together as quickly as possible. If he stands at the kitchen window eating pasta and watching the lights in the workshop, that’s no one’s business but his.

Packages begin arriving two days later, piling up on the porch and then in the living room and spilling into the dining room. He catalogs each item as they arrive, staging them according to the order they’ll go out onto the porch or the yard. His original design has begun to evolve; he makes two more trips to pick up more of the happy pumpkins. When he sees a couple days of warmer weather in the forecast, he leaps at the opportunity and begins a frenzy of decorating, working nearly sun up to sun down.

Garlands and decorative topiaries go first, framing out the door and windows and the porch pillars. The topiaries are enormous and explode with colorful leaves, fake berries, and round plastic apples that look real enough to bite. Those, he’ll leave through Thanksgiving as neutral structure fit for the entire length of fall. Layering over those, he adds swathes of faux cobwebs with spiders that are fuzzy, with big, googly eyes and smiles; they’re more cuddly than frightening. There are statues of friendly little ghosts, also smiling happily, to give it a Halloween feel.

He arranges the happy pumpkins so they appear to spill down the wide front steps, or perhaps up the steps, and out into the front yard, where he’s converted the lawn into two halves of an enormous pumpkin patch. More friendly ghosts; more glittering, golden garlands strung along the walk to the porch and along the sidewalk. Some of the fallen branches from the backyard work perfectly to create the look of a wild, tangled bramble of pumpkin vines.

When he stands across the street to see the total effect, he’s satisfied that the house doesn’t look frightening or scary at all. It’s a riot of autumn colors and smiling, welcoming pumpkin faces staring back at him. If it snows before Halloween, he thinks that will only add to the look he’s going for.

His neighbor, Barnes, has also been decorating. He blinks a few times, wondering how he’d missed Barnes working in the yard, since they must’ve been out at the same time. Barnes’ yard is as far from Steve’s as it’s possible to get. There are gravestones and zombie arms reaching up from the ground and bloody handprints on the windows of the ground floor. All of the pumpkins wear angry or evil expressions, their mouths open in rows of jagged, hungry teeth. It looks like Barnes is half way into turning his home into a haunted house amusement ride. 

Some of the kids will prefer scary to friendly, he reasons, and decides the contrast will work in both their favors. The parents will probably work it out to visit Barnes first, then follow that up with a far less scary house. It couldn’t be more perfect if they’d planned it.

With the decorations well in hand, he turns his attention to the treats. Reading recipes, he discovers, requires a certain amount of interpretation and practice. The first batch of pumpkin spice butter caramels end up hard enough to crack teeth and he scrapes them ruefully into the trash bin. As he’s washing the trays, he happens to glance up and see a man standing at the end of Barnes’ driveway, scowling at the front of Steve’s house. It must be Barnes. He pauses, frowning. The scowl doesn’t seem friendly. If the caramels had worked out, he could’ve wrapped up a few dozen and taken them over as a  _ Hello _ .

Maybe the candy corn bark will turn out better.

He puts his scowling neighbor on the list of problems to tackle. It’s not like he doesn’t have enough on his plate with trying to get the house into a state fit for anyone but him to get further than the front door. He’s started entertaining the idea of opening up the front two rooms on Halloween. After all, it might be cold and the kids would need a few minutes to warm up before they continue on their trek for candy plunder. He could invite the security detail, who - he’s noticed - haven’t put up a single holiday decoration. Where’s their sense of dedication to the job?

The third batch of candy corn bark does, in fact, turn out well enough that he feels good about piling a healthy amount into a small basket and carrying it over to his scowling neighbor’s porch. It’s early - or late - and no lights are on, so he doesn’t knock, but it has a card stating it’s from him, with his name and possibly more information than is strictly necessary. He wants to be  _ neighborly  _ and isn’t quite sure how that works yet. The best role model he has for a neighbor in this day and age is JARVIS, which always leaned toward intrusive surveillance. He doesn’t want Barnes to think he’s standing in his kitchen with a pair of binoculars like a creep.

Once he gets the candy corn bark right, the others seem to fall into place. He’s figured out the older style stovetop and oven now, knows how to turn the pans or dial down the temperature fifteen degrees below what the recipe calls for because it runs hot. Mornings turn into adventures in baking, leaving the afternoons, and what warmth and sunlight there is on cold, fall days, for working on the yard. At some point, the leaves have to stop falling, but he’s beginning to wonder if trees have an infinite storage of leaves somewhere. It wouldn’t be the strangest thing he’s ever seen. He hasn’t gotten any cease and desist messages from Scowling Neighbor, so he bundles up a sample of his latest experiment after dinner and leaves it on the porch with another cheerful note.

His neighbor’s yard, he’s noticed, continues to gain more zombies, vampires, and frightening looking pumpkins. At this rate, he won’t be able to see the ground by Halloween, but he’s pleased to know his neighbor appreciates decorating for the holiday as much as he does.

He never expected he’d enjoy it. Drawing out plans; paging through catalogs; searching for new and unique and the one thing that will bring his idea to life. It’s creating art all over his lawn and front porch. More than that, it makes him feel less like a stranger staying in a strange house for an indeterminate amount of time and more like a homeowner who actually belongs there. 

The first pumpkin appears on Barnes’ porch roof, two clawed, vine hands gripping the edge and, for Steve, it’s a revelation. He’d never even considered the  _ roof _ in his decorating plans. Back at the drawing board with pencil and paper, he dreams big and then spends a weekend hunting for the supplies he’ll need to pull it off. 

It takes two days, a lot of coffee, and more than a few sore thumbs after hitting himself with a hammer, but once it’s done, it’s spectacular.

Pumpkins, big and small, some with faces and some without, now span each peak of the roof and porch. More vines drop cascades of pumpkins down in strategic locations, giving the whole house the look of a wild pumpkin jungle. There are pumpkins of gold and silver, some that glitter and sparkle in the sunshine; pumpkins in reds, yellow, purples, and more variations of orange than he’d knew existed. For lack of a better word, he thinks it looks  _ magical _ and that’s exactly what he was going for. It gives him a sense of accomplishment that he’s missed feeling without a mission or a bad guy to defeat.

He’s in the home stretch now, counting down the last few days to Halloween, so he focuses on the house and the finishing touches on his giveaway treats. A surprise find in an old chest provides a costume idea so serendipitous that he snaps a picture and sends it to both Sam and Natasha, who reply mostly with laughing and thumbs up emojis.

Beside his pile of catalogs, he starts a careful catalog of all the antique furniture, clothing, and miscellaneous items he’ll have to figure out what to do with. Maybe get them appraised, he thinks, if he can figure that out. He could call Tony and have an entire team go through the house in a week, but he finds that he enjoys working through the house room by room, discovering the hidden layers of all the lives lived within the walls. There are pressed flowers in books and children’s drawings fallen behind bookcases; glimpses into the people who were there before him. He wonders what he’ll leave behind for the next owner to find. There’s a box of cabinet knobs that look hand painted by children and maybe they were. He sets those aside to keep, thinking he can turn them into something decorative.

When four o’clock rolls around the afternoon of Halloween Day, he’s as ready as he’ll ever be. It’s going to be a cold night so he makes room on the porch for two heat lamps to keep the patch in front of the door warm. With some maneuvering, they don’t detract from his army of cheerful pumpkins. The treat bags are ready by the door and he adjusts the dark grey tie four times before he thinks it looks right.

Kids start arriving before five o’clock, enough time elapsed to get out of school and go home to get their costumes on. His first group is small, with a Red Riding Hood and her brother, the Ninja Warrior, shepherded by their harried looking mother. She looks apprehensive when Steve opens the door, but visibly relaxes almost immediately. With as cheerful smile as he can manage, he crouches down to the kids’ level and compliments them on their costumes as he gives them their treat bundles to add to their plastic pumpkins.

“There’s a list inside,” he tells their mother quietly. “With ingredients for everything. So you can check and be sure it’s safe for them to eat.”

She blinks at him. The little boy is tugging at her hand, ready to head to the next house. Shaking herself, she smiles brightly. “Welcome to the neighborhood! And happy Halloween!”

“Happy Halloween,” he calls after them as they start down the stairs. There’s already another family turning up the walk.

As the evening progresses, he sees several Draculas, a few more ninjas, a handful of the Avengers, including a few Captain Americas, which turn his smile a bit wistful. He texts Sam each time he gets a Falcon. There are more costumes he can’t identify, from video games or cartoons he’s never seen, and he tries to ask and remember what each kid tells him. The night gets colder as it gets later and the age of the kids coming to the door begins to creep upward toward the teens, most of them in groups without any adults supervising. They’re polite and curious and a few stay long enough for a conversation that carefully skirts around who he is and why he’s not off saving the world. He thinks a few of them must assume he’s there on a super secret mission and, for the few brave enough to ask, he doesn’t answer either way.

By ten o’clock, he figures the traffic is about done for the night and there are only a few goody bags left when the doorbell rings one last time. It’s a willowy brunette with a boy about ten years old dressed as a pirate. Her expression turns to amusement as she looks him up and down.

“Are you dressed as Mister Rogers?” Her lips quirk as though she’s trying hard not to laugh.

“I am,” he says, holding out a goody bag for the boy to add to his sack.

“Becca Barnes. And this is my son Teddy.” She holds out her hand, nodding toward his neighbor. “Your neighbor is my brother. But I’m sure he hasn’t introduced himself at all.”

“Uh, not yet, no.”

“He appreciates the treats you’ve been leaving for him.” She stops when Teddy makes a coughing noise and rolls her eyes. “Alright, Teddy and I appreciate them.”

“Mostly you,” Teddy teases.

“I appreciate your cooking, Mister Rogers,” she says, laughing.

“I’m happy to cook.” He glances across at his neighbor’s house. “I wasn’t sure about just going over and introducing myself. He seems to keep unusual hours and I didn’t want to intrude.”

She waves away his concern. “He’s hardly winning neighbor of the year any time soon. He does better with five hundred year old armoires or oil paintings, not so well with people anymore. He’s a good guy though, little rough around the edges these days, that’s all.”

Steve nods. “I know the type.”

“I bet you do.” There’s a note of sadness in her voice but it’s gone in the next moment. “We won’t monopolize you but we had to stop by. I love what you’ve done with the porch. All the pumpkins. It’s beautiful.”

“Thank you.” He grabs a couple extra goody bags and holds them out. “For you and your brother. Tell him happy Halloween for me.”

“Will do.” 

There’s no one after that and he finally shuts off the porch lights near midnight. The wind has kicked up, making the night so bitterly cold that even the most diehard of trick or treaters have long since retreated to the warmth of indoors. Humming snatches of songs he remembers from the War, he tidies up the kitchen and dining room where he’d assembled all of the goody bags; the dining table has served as his command center. He straightens the piles of catalogs and notes, separating out the lists of changes he wants to make for Thanksgiving, and another list of recipes to try. He’ll be on his own for roasting a turkey this year, which might be an adventure. Briefly, he considers inviting his reclusive neighbor and his less reclusive sister and nephew, but that seems a bit forward. He could always invite the surveillance team.

He makes tea. He reads. Finally he lies in bed and stares at the ceiling as his thoughts wind down. The old house creaks and the wind makes eerie sounds around the edges of the windows. It’s harder when he’s lying alone in bed to pretend that the hundred or more pumpkins out in his yard weren’t an attempt to fill the Accords shaped hole in his life. Everything he’d come to call home was gone; the Avengers, the shield, fighting the good fight. Handing out a dozen batches of pumpkin spice butter caramels to children seems like a pathetic substitute for stopping rogue agents peddling chemical weapons.

He thinks about the lights he sees in the workshop behind his neighbor’s house and wonders if the three o’clock in the morning demons keep Barnes awake as well. There are days where it’s always three o’clock in the morning; those are the worst days. He gets them sometimes, maybe Barnes does to.

Maybe he’s projecting again. Like the pumpkins.

Maybe he’s lying in bed imaging a neighbor who would understand how three o’clock in the morning can linger long after the sun has risen because he’s lonely. Because he wants to imagine that there’s someone he could form a real connection with, who would see him and understand him, despite being a cohort of one in a scientific experiment no one could replicate. He filled his yard with pumpkins and made two hundred goody bags because he wanted to belong here. In this house, in this neighborhood, in this community with its church with the red door and its monuments. He thought that he could build a home if he tried hard enough.

At three o’clock in the morning, he doesn’t believe it will work. He thinks homes have to be found rather than built and he’s lost his chance at having a family. He’s let a hundred chances slip through his fingers and no amount of smiling, friendly pumpkins will make up for that. But those are three o’clock in the morning thoughts, which never do anyone any good. He sets them aside to focus on how he’ll change the decorations for Thanksgiving, letting the mental exercise of imagining the changes lull him to sleep. 

The next morning, with a few hours of sleep under his belt, he lets his morning routine carry him through breakfast and getting dressed for working in the yard. At the last moment, he pulls on the red sweater jacket he’d used as part of his costume because it’s warm and comfortable in a way modern clothes didn’t quite manage. He tackles the porch first, armed with empty boxes and a checklist. Ghosts and smiling pumpkins go into the boxes, clearing the way for a variety of colorful gourds and fat, ceramic turkeys. He has a long, silent debate with himself over the ethics of Thanksgiving decorations and whether or not he should pick up any Pilgrim hats or possibly, American Indian headdresses. Or both. Or he could stick with fake vegetables and colorful leaves and sidestep the entire debate.

Over lunch and an enormous mug of coffee, he has another argument with himself over whether or not refusing to pick a side in his decorating makes him complicit.

Sunlight through the windows distracts him with that mellow calmness only fall can bring, as though the trees settling down to sleep through the winter around him is something that can be felt in the air. Mug cradled between his hands, he drops himself into one of the armchairs and watches the last of the leaves falling through his sun dappled view. It’s peaceful; a balm for the three o’clock in the morning thoughts trying to haunt him into the day. He’s about to slip into a nap when pounding on the front door ends his peaceful fall reverie. 

A piece of luck, really. He’d been about to dump his cooling coffee all over himself. Readjusting his grip on the mug, he goes to answer the door. Hardly anyone has stopped by who wasn’t delivering packages and he’s not expecting anything today.

The man standing on his front porch is tall with broad shoulders. Steve gets the impression of sturdy working boots, worn blue jeans, and brown hair that just brushes his shoulders, but where his attention really sticks is the plaid, flannel shirt. It’s the kind of shirt that Steve wants to buy a hundred of but couldn’t find. It looks soft enough to sleep in and well made. The sleeves are rolled up to the man’s elbows, over a pale, long-sleeved undershirt that has that tinge of blue suggesting it had been washed along with the jeans at least once. He’s still fixated on the way the reds and blues of the flannel shirt weave together when the man starts talking.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

Steve blinks, fairly certain that isn’t a standard greeting. “Huh?” He drags his gaze away from the shirt and realizes after a moment that the man isn’t looking at him. Instead, he’s looking down and to the side, as though looking directly at Steve might be physically painful.

“You can’t just waltz in here and do all this,” the man waves emphatically at the porch and the yard. “I’ve won that prize for the last five years. It’s what I do. That’s my  _ thing _ , okay? I spend all year working on that shit. And Halloween isn’t supposed to be cute. It’s not about cute. Kids get that cute crap the rest of the holidays but Halloween is the one holiday they’re allowed to have scary stuff and that’s good for them. Having a safe place to deal with scary shit is important.”

Steve’s brain is still stuck on the word  _ prize. _ “What are you talking about?”

“You can’t make Halloween all about fuzzy spiders and those...those fucking pumpkins.” He sounds genuinely aggrieved that Steve decorated his yard with happy faces. “If kids don’t have a safe way to be exposed to that kind of stuff, how’re we supposed to expect them to face scary shit when they’re adults?”

“Um. I, uh, I see your point.” He’s still not sure what that has anything to do with a prize, but the man seems more upset that Steve’s yard didn’t frighten children. He has no idea who this man is, but he’s got a sneaking suspicion there’s a likely suspect. He tries again, “I, uh, I’m sorry?”

“It’s just...Halloween’s always been my thing. Mine and Teddy’s.” He’s staring down at his boots now.

That confirms his suspicions, although it makes the conversation no less confusing. “Uh, Mister Barnes?”

“James,” he mutters. “Bucky. Or whatever.”

“Okay, whatever.” Steve doesn’t manage to keep from smiling at that. “You, uh, said something about a prize?”

“Best Decorated in the neighborhood.” Barnes has both hands in his pockets now and if his shoulders get any higher, they’ll be stuck to his ears. “I’ve won it. For Halloween. Few years now.”

“Last five you said?” Steve steps back, motioning with his mug. “Why don’t you come in and have some coffee? It’s not fresh but shouldn’t be too bad.”

Barnes visibly hesitates but steps inside so Steve can close the door and steer him toward the kitchen. He seems determined to keep staring at his boots though, even while Steve pours him a cup of coffee and sets it down on the kitchen table. Grudgingly, Barnes accepts the coffee.

“Your zombies were pretty scary. And the jack-o-lantern on the roof. Did you make them yourself?” Steve offers. Barnes isn’t giving him a lot to go on here as far as conversation.

“Yeah.”

“That’s neat. That you can do that kind of thing. Mine were all, uh, stuff I found.”

Barnes’ mouth twists like the coffee’s too bitter. “It looks like Pottery Barn and Balsam Hill threw up all over your porch.”

That’s  _ fair _ , Steve thinks, wondering if he has time to hide the pile of Pottery Barn catalogs he has on the dining room table. He thinks it must’ve taken a lot for Barnes to come over in a fit of righteous anger over acceptable Halloween decorations, since he has yet to look Steve in the face for more than a second. Although he’s standing in Steve’s kitchen, he’s holding the coffee mug like it’s fine china and he looks nervous as a stray cat who wandered in for some tuna fish.

“So, uh, do you have any strong feelings on Thanksgiving decorations? Just so I know.” Steve watches the minute contortions as Barnes seems to wage an internal war over how to answer the question. Finally, he shakes his head, his cheeks gone flushed a deep red that complements his shirt. “What about Christmas? Have you won that one for the last five years too?”

Barnes glances up for the barest second, enough for Steve to see his eyes flash. “Yes,” he admits stiffly. “You gonna decorate for that too?”

“Yup.” Steve sips his coffee, acting like they’re discussing the weather and waiting to see how Barnes will take the challenge. “Probably Easter too. Fluffy bunnies everywhere, I think. Big fluffy bunnies. And definitely the Fourth of July. Definitely.”

Barnes chokes on his coffee a bit and the corners of his mouth quirk like he’s trying not to smile. “You can have the Fourth.”

“Not your  _ thing _ then?”

Barnes sinks into himself a little, his voice quieter. “Don’t care for the fireworks.” 

“Fair enough.” Steve moves away to refill his own coffee mug now that it’s mostly gone cold. “Does Teddy usually help you build the decorations? He seemed like a good kid.”

“He’s learning how to code too. Make the animatronics. The jack-o-lantern was his idea, really. They’re really creative at that age, you know? Before the system hammers it out of them. He’s just got his mom and it’s hard for Becca to cover all the bases so I try to step in where I can. His deadbeat dad didn’t want to stick around for a kid.” Barnes stops suddenly, as though he’s said too much, and the deep blush is back in his cheeks. “Sorry.”

“It’s alright. Although,” he tips his head trying to get a better look at Barnes’ face. “Gotta admit that I’m more used to having conversations with people who prefer a little eye contact.”

“That’s...sorry.” Barnes has gone from skittish to spooked. “I should go. Sorry for bothering you.”

“Wait, wait. It’s alright. You can stare at the floor if you want. Finish your coffee.”

“Is that an order?” Barnes says so quietly that Steve might’ve missed it without enhanced hearing.

It feels like another puzzle piece that makes up his neighbor who does best with old paintings and furniture and doesn’t like fireworks and thinks kids need ways to safely learn how to face scary things.

“Army?” Steve guesses.

Barnes nods. He looks like he wants to hide under the table but keeps sipping at his coffee as though it had been a direct order.

“You’re out now?”

Another nod. Barnes’ mouth twists again. “Done taking orders from assholes for the rest of my life.” He winces visibly, eyes closing as he lets out a shaky breath. “Sorry. Sir.”

Steve hadn’t expected that. “Hey, I’m done taking orders from assholes too.”

“I didn’t...coming over here like I did...it was disrespectful.” Barnes looks like he’s steeling himself to face a court martial. 

“Bucky,” Steve says softly. “I’m retired. And I’m the asshole neighbor who apparently stole your Best Decorated prize for Halloween. You’re fine.” He waits until he sees Barnes begin to relax. “No one’s told me about this prize though, so maybe I didn’t win it after all. Although now I know there’s a contest....”

Finally, Bucky looks up and his eyes are impossibly blue. “Don’t you dare,” he breathes.

“You know. Our driveways are right next to each other and I figure it’s only twenty five feet or so from my porch roof to yours. Wouldn’t be hard, with your skills, to figure out a way to string some lights between them. Maybe Teddy could help us come up with some ideas.” He watches Bucky figure out what Steve’s trying to say, watches the expressions flit across his face as he tries to decide if Steve’s joking and what ulterior motives Steve might have. “Are you hungry? I have a recipe for cinnamon rolls that I’ve been meaning to try.”

“Cinnamon rolls,” Bucky repeats incredulously.

“Yeah. You can keep me company while I get started if you want.” He sets down his mug and starts collecting what he’ll need: trays, mixing bowls, measuring cups, ingredients. Bucky stays in his seat. “Your sister mentioned you were good with antiques?”

“I guess.”

He opens the old tin flour canister and starts measuring out cups into the largest bowl. “I’ve got a whole house full and no idea what to do with them. If you’re looking for a new client. Your usual going rate, of course. Expertise like yours is valuable.”

Bucky is silent for a long time, watching Steve make the cinnamon roll dough. When he finally speaks, it’s to ask a question. “Did you really dress up as Mister Rogers for Halloween?”


End file.
